Recommended children's booklists sorted by age or topic

Author & Illustrators

Viviane Schwarz Books

The Flying Machine of Dreams

Poetry

This is a magnificently vibrant and bouncy book of poems for early years and KS1, filled with musicality, movement and magical wonder. The poems float beautifully on the pages, one spread for each poem, majestically illustrated by Schwarz.

From first poems on waking up to the morning moon to other marvels of nature such as ways of looking at a leaf, being a bubble and raindrops, Wakeling’s poems are accessible but also filled with sounds to savour in the mouth. In particular, Wakeling focuses on the reader’s relationship with the world – heightened awareness of the body in a poem about a bellybutton, feeling what it’s like to move slowly in Song of the Slow or fast in The Magnificent Race of the Animals.

There is humour galore – Mr Tring, for example, is a delightful poem about memory and personality. Some rhymes, all with pleasing rhythm, this is a poet at the height of her talent, delighting children with a first and certainly not last dip into poetry. For those just learning words in all their wonderful shapes and variety, this is a brilliant colourful and lively first exploration of the genre. I couldn’t recommend it more. I will be reading this aloud with all of EYFS and KS1!

One-Button and the Sea

Sara Stanley & Viviane Schwarz

Picturebook

Through collaborative story telling, a child and his grandfather explore a traumatic experience they have shared.

‘Grandpa, tell me the story again of when we went to sea. That’s a BIG story, One-Button.

How does it begin? It begins with the uprooting . . .’

And so Grandpa tells the story of how he and One-Button and their whole community were uprooted from their everyday lives, and how they all had to take to sea in different boats. Until one day everything changed, and they were able to return home and resume their previous lives…different, but the same.

How to Find Gold

Viviane Schwarz

Picturebook

From the award-winning picture book creator of There Are Cats in This Book comes a story of imaginative play and of two friends, Anna and Crocodile, who are on the hunt for gold. But finding gold isn’t easy. Oh no! It’s dangerous and difficult… Just what will the two friends discover? Teeming with adventurous spirit and boasting wonderfully funny dialogue, this story introduces two unforgettable characters in a gorgeous, classic new art style from Viviane Schwarz, one of the most innovative and creatively inspired picture book makers of today.

Ergo

Alexis Deacon & Viviane Schwarz

Picturebook

From award-winning picture book makers Alexis Deacon and Viviane Schwarz comes an enlightening new story about discovering the world – and your place in it.

For budding philosophers of all ages, this is the uplifting story of Ergo the chick. Ergo wakes up and sets about exploring her world. She discovers her toes. She discovers her wings and her beak. She has discovered EVERYTHING! But then she considers the wall. And something outside the wall goes BUMP. What could it be? The only way to find out is to peck peck peck through to the other side…

This is an inspiring story told with heaps of humour. Like its predecessor, I Am Henry Finch, Ergo is a book for everyone – from the very young to the very old. It is for dreamers, philosophers, artists, the foolish and the enlightened. A profound picture book experience told with simplicity and style.